Last night, at the "Rock to Save Darfur Concert-Benefit," City Councilman Eric Gioia told Talib Kweli that he'd like to replace Mos Def as the other half of Blackstar. Kweli laughed and shook his head.

Gioia was at B.B. King's Blues Club in Times Square, along with a handful of hip-hop artists and human rights activists, as one of the sponsors of a City Council resolution asking the New York City pension fund to divest from Sudan.

“I’ve been working on this for about two years, and its kind of a lonely fight,” Gioia told me backstage before he addressed the crowd.  read more »

There was no dancing at the Seneca Club's 109th Dinner Dance--a veritable sea of elected officials--but there were about 55 honorees, who received diamond-shaped trophies and dined on a buffet that included a kosher option.

“It’s sort of like a political bazaar that’s as much like Baghdad as it is anything else," said Roger Adler, a judicial candidate for the 1st Civil Court District in Brooklyn. "There’s a chuckle quality to it, like, give me a break, this is like polyester. And then there’s the more substantive one--people are brought together.”

Outside the buffet, I caught Representative Ed Towns, who was on his way out after receiving an award.

“This is one of the oldest clubs in the borough,” he told me. “In order to be around for over 100 years you have to have a level of consistency, and also the ability to evolve with the community -- Greenpoint is not the same as it was a hundred years ago,” he said, gesturing outside as a man rolled by in a motorized wheelchair.  read more »

Here's an invitation for a David Yassky fund-raiser tonight on the Upper West Side.

One of the event's hosts is Andrew Tomback, a long-time Yassky contributor who has also given some money to Eric Gioia and, once, back in the day, to Alan Hevesi.

Other notable names include John Alschuler, who has contributed to progressive Democrats like Mark Green and Ruth Messinger. Alschuler has also given money to another comptroller candidate, Melinda Katz ($250 on July 7, 2007).

And there's also Charles Simon, who ran in a special election for an Assembly seat, but was defeated by Linda Rosenthal.  read more »

Anthony Weiner wasn't the only New York elected official in Puerto Rico campaigning for Hillary Clinton--Eric Gioia was there, too.

A spokesperson said, "Eric believes deeply in Hillary; he's known her since he worked in the White House, so whenever she needs support he'll be there."

Here’s Mark Page trying to respond to Eric Gioia’s agressive inquiries about the budget at City Hall today.

As this dispatch from intern Bharat Ayyar shows, Eric Gioia wasn't the only Council member who yelled at Mark Page today:

High above the action, seated on the upper level at the Council Chambers at City Hall, third and fourth grade students from P.S. 60 observed Friday's hearings on the budget.

"Pay attention. There'll be a test later," quipped Finance Committee Chair David Weprin.

As different members of the council lined up to grill Mark Page, the director of the city Office of Management and Budget, on the '09 budget, which must be approved by the end of June, it quickly became clear that much of the debate would center on education.

District 7 Councilman Robert Jackson of Manhattan butted heads with Page at the hearing on issues of funding and what he said was the city's wavering commitment to the Contracts for Excellence with the state.

At a hearing earlier this week, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein said that it would take $400 million to maintain city schools at 07-08 levels. Without that money, Klein made it clear that cuts would be made. The mayor's proposed budget allocates $428 million less for education than what had originally been planned. Various Council members have said that they will not allow the budget to pass if "there's a dime being cut from the classroom."

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Robert Jackson didn't approve of fellow Councilman Eric Gioia’s line of questioning at a hearing on the Council's phony-appropriations scandal this afternoon.

“I think it was political grandstanding on the part of Eric Gioia and his run for public advocate. But, quite frankly, I don’t know if he received any brownie points in that.”

Councilman Eric Gioia grilled the city’s budget director about the slush fund scandal during a heated Council hearing in City Hall just now.

Gioia asked, pointedly, whose job is to make sure there are no phony organizations in the city budget and what guarantees exist to ensure there are no fake groups in this year’s budget.

The budget director, Mark Page, said at one point that he felt like he was “being grilled by a local prosecutor.” He added, “I’m not sure this is the forum for you to be asking me these questions.”

When pressed about whose job it was to catch the phony groups, Page said that his agency got a list from the City Council, implicitly laying the blame with the head of the City Council, Christine Quinn. (One of her top aides, Chuck Meara, was sitting in the front row in the City Council chambers during the hearing, taking note of the exchange.)

Page told Gioia, “Your question about assurance from me that there’s nothing fraudulent in the line items [of the budget], logistically, is -- looking backwards -- is a problem for me as to how to do it.”  read more »

Local Republican consultant Bill O’Reilly recalls going to speak to the editorial board of “a New York publication” about two years ago.

“And the question was, ‘Can you identify any up-and-comers in New York politics—besides Eric Gioia?’”

That would be 35-year-old Councilman Eric Gioia of Queens, who is preparing for the next step in what has been a tidy political career.  read more »

Councilman and candidate for public advocate Eric Gioia, of Queens, held his 35th birthday celebration and “green” campaign kick off at the W Hotel’s Whiskey Bar in Times Square last night. His guest list included Morgan Spurlock, writer and director of Super Size Me (who appeared in an ad recently), and Karenna Gore Schiff, daughter of Al.

Gore Schiff was in charge of the birthday introduction, while Gioia spent most of the evening surrounded by supporters bouncing with American Idol enthusiasm.  read more »